


Queen of Hearts

by xspike4evax



Category: Angel: the Series
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-01
Updated: 2016-07-01
Packaged: 2018-07-19 11:34:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7359595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xspike4evax/pseuds/xspike4evax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Her friends abandonment had been the trigger to send her into their arms and neither Angel nor Spike could ever be sorry for it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Queen of Hearts

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Trigger from the prompt table and display of affection from the valentine bingo card at bad_swa

Angel crept into the bedroom as quietly as he had left it. A night of demon hunting and then Willow and Spike made him hungry. He knew it was because he drank pig’s blood instead of human blood, but Angel still couldn’t bring himself to drink human blood, even bagged blood. 

Even her blood. 

He placed a bottle of water on the nightstand and stood beside the bed looking down at them sleeping peacefully. Willow lay on her side with Spike curled around her. Spike had caught hold of her hand at some point and their twined fingers rested over her heart. Almost as if they were protecting it. Angel smiled slightly, Willow had no fear of a broken heart; she held his heart in one hand and Spike's in the other. Angel knew it was difficult for her to believe it sometimes. The past had a nasty habit of creeping up on a person when they least expected it; especially when they were happy. And Willow was happy now. 

He was happy now.

Spike was happy now.

Sometimes it was unsettling. Being happy was a new concept for Angel. This feeling of love was new to him. He had loved Buffy of course, but that love had been paved with heartache and misery. As much as Buffy had been worth it, and as much as Angel would go through it all again with her; loving Buffy had been hard. 

Loving Willow was easier. Hell, loving Spike was easier. There was nothing complicated with either of them. Even if Spike could be the biggest pain in the ass Angel had ever come across. 

Willow let out a sleepy little sigh and Angel’s smile deepened. It had taken some getting used to, sleeping in the same bed as a human. Vampires didn’t sleep the way humans did. He and Spike were still in sleep and at first Angel had found sharing a bed with Willow uncomfortable. She was warm and squirmy and noisy. Not that Willow meant to be, it was just with her breathing and her heart beat and little muffled sleepy sounds it felt like he was lying next to a mariachi band. He was so used to the solitude of sleeping alone. 

Spike had always been more adaptable than him and had taken to Willow sleeping next to him as he did everything else; with annoying ease. Spike liked her warmth, said it helped him sleep. He liked the steady beat of her heart, said it soothed him. 

Angel had gotten used to Willow quicker than he had thought he would and now he couldn’t imagine her not being beside him, her breath ghosting over his shoulder as she dreamed her human dreams. 

The bed sheets rustled as Spike shifted in his sleep, his head moving from the pillow closer to Willow’s shoulder. He pressed his mouth against her, lips parting on her skin, sucking lightly. She’d have a red mark there in the morning, but Willow wouldn’t mind.

Angel frowned down at Spike. He couldn’t understand Spike’s control. How could Spike feel Willow’s soft skin under his mouth like that and not bite her? When his mouth touched Willow’s skin Angel was awake, they were together in this bed enjoying each other and Angel was aware of each touch they exchanged. But Spike was asleep right now and somehow the demon in him didn’t come out. There was a mark on Willow’s throat, a small scab that never completely healed because Spike kept dislodging it every few days to take a drink from her vein. Somehow Spike could do that, he could take a mouthful of her blood and back off, be content, not need to drain every last drop from her body. 

It was Spike’s way of showing affection and it was Willow’s way of showing hers for Spike. She accepted and embraced their demonic nature. 

Angel knew it was his own fault he couldn’t show her the same affection. If he bit her, if her blood burst into his mouth Angel was terrified he wouldn’t be able to stop drinking. He remembered what it had been like drinking from Buffy, he couldn’t risk losing control and killing Willow the way he had almost killed Buffy. A shudder ran through him, it didn’t bear thinking about. Angel had lived so long trying to deny the demon that he couldn’t control the demon in him the way Spike controlled his. He envied Spike’s control. 

Slipping back into bed, Angel settled on his side facing Willow. He liked to watch her sleep, it calmed him. She stirred, as though her subconscious recognised another presence near her. Her hand groped towards him, slender fingers curling around his wrist as she relaxed again. 

It was hard for Angel to imagine Willow going off the deep end with magic. But her friends had been adamant she was some sort of magic junkie which had resulted in Spike bringing her to L.A. as Giles put it: “To recover out of harm’s way.” 

Willow had interpreted that to mean: “Get her out of Sunnydale before she does any more damage.”

She had always been there for her friends no matter what was going on in their lives, no matter how much they were at fault; but they had let her down. They had dumped her on to him and Wesley, happy enough to let them deal with what they considered to be Willow’s addiction. 

Angel remembered when Willow had first arrived in L.A.; lonely, frightened, ashamed of what she was. She had stuck pretty close to Spike, asked him to stay with her a few days. Angel had been surprised that Spike had agreed to stay, but really, what was there in Sunnydale for Spike to return to. In L.A. with Willow he was needed and Spike liked to be needed. 

Seeing Willow hurt made Angel hurt. It brought the demon out in him. He wanted to destroy her enemies and make her smile again. But the demon in him also rejoiced over that vulnerable girl who had walked into his home, for Angel knew she wouldn’t return to live in Sunnydale. Willow had a life here with him and with Spike. Willow belonged with them now. 

Her friend’s abandonment had been the trigger to drive her into his and Spike’s arms and Angel knew neither he nor Spike, however much it had hurt Willow at the time, could ever be sorry for that.


End file.
